Ignoring the Physical Universe 57 



the word struggle to the process of adapting the 

 physical universe to the needs of man : 



This is a real abuse of words. Struggle ought always 

 to imply the intention to destroy one another. No 

 struggle can take place between or against inanimate 

 bodies; this becomes a simple metaphor.^ 



To say that the relations between man and his 

 physical environment are not a struggle and to re- 

 serve this term uniquely for the relations between 

 men is to fail to see ninety-nine one hundredths 

 of our activity. Mr. d'Eichthal is perfectly right 

 in saying that the action of one inanimate body on 

 another can only be described as a struggle by a 

 metaphorical use of the word, but the relations 

 between man and the physical environment, which 

 includes the entire world — mineral, vegetable, and 

 animal, is a real struggle in the literal sense of the 

 terms. 



As a matter of fact struggle never has for its 

 object the destruction of the adversary. Its 

 object is always to transform the environment 

 so that the individual may survive. When a 

 farmer plucks the weed of a field in order to sow 

 wheat, it is not for the purpose of harming the 

 weed, but in order to have bread. When the 

 microbes of tuberculosis are killed by a disinfect- 

 ant, it is not done for the sake of destroying the 

 microbes, but with the object of saving the life 

 of a human being. The "social Darwinists" 



' Guerre et paix internationales, Paris, 1909, p. 7. 



